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LIBRARY ^F CONGRESS. 

PRESENTED BY 

UHITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



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AN ADDRESS 



ON 



CONGREGATIONALISM 



AS AFFECTED BY THE DECLARATIONS OF THE 



ADVISORY COUNCIL 



HELD IX BROOKLYN', X. Y,. FEBRUARY, 1876; 



RICHARD S. STORRS, D. D., 



PASTOR OF TEE CHURCH OF THE PILGRIMS, 



IN BROOKLYN. 



DELIVERED MARCH 12th, 1870. 



WITH THE 



PROCEEDIXGS OP THE CHURCH OF THE PILGRIMS, IX RELATION THERETO, 






MARCH 13th, 187G. 



?-A^ 



^Pc^% 



LETTER OF REQUEST 



Beooklyn, N. Y., Marcli 7, 1876. 



Dear Dr. Storrs : 



The undersigned^ members of the Church of the Pilgrims^ 
in view of the disturbed feeling existing in the church in 
respect of the Result of the late AdMsory Council^ request 
you to give notice from the pidpit next Sunday morning^ of 
a church-meeting on next Monday evening^ in the Lecture- 
Room^ at 8 o'clock^ to consider what action the church should 
take with reference to that Result. We also request you to 
state your mew of the Result of that Council to the congrega- 
tion, at the Sunday evening service. 

With affectionate Christian regard, 

Truly Tours, 

RiCHAED P. Buck, Aechibald Baxtee, 

A. G. Allen, C. L. Mitchell, 

Waltee T. Hatch, Dwight Johnsojs", 

Jeeemiah p. Robinson, Sidney Geeen, 

Geoege L. Nichols, Lucien Biedseye, 

Feanklin Woodeuee, Joshua M. Van Cott. 

To the Rey. R. S. Stoees, D. D. 



In compliance with the foregoing Letter of Request ^ Rev. 
Dr. Storrs read to the congregation^ at the service on Sunday 
evening, March 12th, 1876, the following 

The fact having become public, by no agency of mine, 
that I have resigned prominent offices in the Congregational 
communion, and it having been naturally inferred by the 
public that I am not in sympathy with recent acts and utter- 
ances of those appearing to represent that communion, it 
seems proper that I should state distinctly the grounds of 
my objection to these, and my reasons for withdrawing from 
the positions which I had held. As to the personal charges 
which have been so long urged against the pastor of the Ply- 
mouth Church, I have never taken any part in the loud and 
painful public discussion ; and I certainly shall not now 
begin. But I have some thoughts, which to me seem just, 
on the relation of the Result of the recent Council to the 
general scheme of Congregational government ; and these I 
am not unwilling to present. Of course, they express only 
my opinions ; and I have no smallest right or Avish to do 
more than state them, for others to think of. But they are 
sincerely entertained, and over my action must be controlling. 

The Advisory Council, whose Kesult I would consider, 
appears to have been one of fair ability, and respectable 
character, though not, perhaps, of unusual moral weight, or 
possessing any pre-eminent share of that indefinable author- 
ity which comes with conceded eminence in knowledge, 
experience, and Christian wisdom. It was large in numbers, 
however, representing a constituency, according to the sta- 
tistics furnished me by a friend, of 34,611 members in the 
churches whose pastors or delegates were present ; whereas 
the churches represented in the Council of 1874 have a pres- 
ent membership, I am told, of only 28, 843. Of the seven- 
teen divines individually invited to the previous Council, but 
ten were present. Of the twenty similarly invited to the 
more recent Council, twelve appeared. 



— 4 — 

The churclies thns represented are scattered, also, very 
fairly over the country ; and, while some of them are of the 
second or perhaps of the third class of chnrches, in respect 
to numbers and public influence, their advice and testimony 
are as proper to be regarded, as indicating the views and the 
practice which obtain among them, as if thej were planted 
in larger towns, and had had more chance to be publicly 
heard of. How far it may be true that a good many of them 
were called to this Council because of the known preposses- 
sions of their pastors in favor of the Plymouth Church 
policy, and of its minister, I have no special means of know- 
ing. Yery likely this was true of a considerable portion. 
The roll of the Council seems to suggest it. The statement 
of the chairman of the business-committee appears to con- 
firm it. And the fact, if it be one, may shed some light on 
the strange conclusions to which they came. Of course, 
while they were here they were naturally and constantly 
under the influence of the pastor who had called them, and 
of his frequent impassioned appeals, and were subject to the 
silent but powerful impression of the representations and 
feelings of the families in which they were being liberally 
entertained. 

All this should fairly be considered in examining the 
Result which was put forth by them, and in estimating its 
probable future effect upon the general denominational 
development. At the same time, there certainly was in the 
Council a considerable number of capable and distinguished 
men^ who have had more or less of moral leadership in Con- 
gregational representative bodies, and whose apparent adhe- 
sion to this Result gives it an importance which it otherwise 
might not have had. Colleges, theological seminaries, some 
prominent churches, were represented in it ; and the name 
of the brave and eloquent veteran who was its senior moder- 
ator, is itself an instrument of great value and force in the 
hands of those who accept the conclusions to which even he 
would appear to have assented. 

Evidently, then, the Result of this Council is something 
which cannot be dismissed, as of trivial importance. As the 
formal, and apparently the unanimous utterance, of the last 



— 5 — 

and largest Congregational Council hitherto convened by a 
single church, it must be pondered by one who would know 
what the denomination is likely in the future to be and to 
do, and how far he can, with justice to his convictions, co- 
operate with it. 

The declarations put forth in the Result to be scrutinized 
are loosely though quite ingeniously stated ; but the mean- 
ing of them is not hard to be found, and the relation of them 
to the organizing principles and the practical working of the 
Congregational system is no more obscure tlian is the moon 
at its full on a clear night. Of course, some of these declar- 
ations are more important than others ; but all have refer- 
ence to occurring cases, and are intended to mould and 
govern church-practice, and so far all have a measure of 
importance. 

1. The Result says, for example, that " in many cases " 
where a member has signified, not in writing or in speech, 
but "by his acts," that he " has abandoned fellowship with 
a church, in doctrine, worship, or Christian sympathy,'^'' it 
may properly separate him from it, without formal censure. 

This is doubtless true, provided no charge has been made 
against the member, affecting his character, and provided, 
after due notice, he makes no objection to this interpretation 
of his acts. But stated indefinitely, as in this declaration, 
and leaving the church wholly at liberty to put its ow^n 
interpretation on such of his acts as it chooses to recognize, 
and to decide'rfor itself whether his is one of the "many 
cases'' where such action is proper, it certainly is a danger- 
ous doctrine. It seems hardly possible that the Council it- 
self foresaw the perilous range of its words. Perhaps its 
members were so intent on the cases of those whose exclu- 
sion they had been brought here to justify, that they quite 
forgot the many others whom such a rash statement would 
equally affect. It places upon substantially the same foot- 
ing, so far as liability to removal is concerned, the man who 
has excited animosities in the church by his zeal for the 
truth, and the man who has left it for the Roman Catholic 
communion. The one may be judged to have shown him- 
self "by his acts" not in fellowship with it "in Christian 



sympathy," as tlie other is not in doctrine, or in worship. 
Under it, so far as appears, a church may at any time cut off 
a member whose opinions and votes on exciting points of 
church-administration differ from those of the majority ; 
while, if this declaration is Congregational law, there is for 
such a one no redress. 

It may possibly be said that the good sense and Christian 
feeling of the church may be relied on to prevent such abuse. 
But good sense and Christian feeling sometimes suffer a sus- 
pense ; and, in the interval, they are not a guaranty for the 
rights which rules are intended to conserve, which this rule, 
if adopted, would leave fatally exposed. No limit is set to 
the exercise of this power on the part of the church. Al- 
most certainly the use of it would swiftly become tyrannical 
abuse, in the hands of an excited and passionate majority ; 
and such an abuse would seem justified beforehand by this 
vague but decided affirmation of the Council. It strikes at 
the man who moves or approves an unwelcome inquiry, as 
directly as at him who spurns and denounces the church it- 
self. The only safety under it must be found in a passive 
agreement with the governing power within the society ; and 
any majority, determined on its ends, which should fail to 
make the church unanimous, under such an unlimited 
charter as this, must be wanting either in perception or in 
pluck. 

Very likely this was not the intention of the Council. 
They may have used words without estimating their force. 
But the intention of the legislator is one thing, the effect of 
his rule is quite another; and that the rule to which I demur 
is capable of exactly this application, I cannot doubt. 

2. Still more dangerous, however, morally at least, is the 
further declaration that when a member has openly aban- 
doned communion with the church, and is also charged with 
a scandalous offense, either by public rumor or by specific 
allegations, "the church may, to avoid greater scandal, use 
a wise discretion in selecting the offense \i. e. , either the 
absence, or the asserted gross wickedness] on which it shall 
separate him from it, and discharge itself from all further 
responsibility for his conduct and character." 



— 7 — 

This may seem plausible ; but, in effect, it relieves every 
church from the duty of investigating any offense of any 
offender, who does not himself prefer to be examined. It 
opens to him an easy way to escape all ecclesiastical inquiry, 
as to the grossest sins, and makes his irresponsibility to the 
church, for whatever foul and flagrant wrong-doing, nearly 
perfect. He is charged with forgery, adultery, slander, or 
with a flagrant breach of trust. He has also for some time 
been absent from the sacraments, as such a man would not 
be unlikely to have been. He may threaten to make a 
troublesome disturbance, if his sins are searched out ; and, 
according to this declaration of the Council, the church 
which he disgraces is under no binding obligation, to the 
community, to other churches, to the man himself, or to the 
Lord and Judge of all, to examine the grounds of the blast- 
ing accusation, though it fill the air, or though it be present- 
ed by specific allegations, and be sustained by unanswerable 
proof. That church is at liberty, " in a wise discretion," to 
evade this painful but salutary duty, and to separate the 
offender from its future fellowship on the ground of his con- 
tinued absence from church. The fleeing forger may be 
properly dismissed, on account of a sudden voyage to Hol- 
land, without reference to any suspected imitations of other 
men' s signatures ; and it might have been ' ' a wise discre- 
tion" — each church must judge — to treat the incestuous 
Corinthian person whom Paul would have had "delivered 
unto Satan," as one not entitled to further communion be- 
cause of irregular church-attendance. 

It will be to some a minor matter that this directly con- 
travenes the Result of the Council of 1874. It authorizes 
the precise course pursued by Plymouth Church in the case 
then considered, which course the previous Council emphat- 
ically condemned, and declared sufficient, if repeated, to 
authorize the withdrawal of fellowship. By that Council 
the familiar Congregational doctrine was affirmed, in these 
terms : " When a regular complaint is made against such a 
member [i. e., one voluntarily absent from the communion 
of the church, and from its worship] that in some other res- 
pect he violates the law of Christ, * ^ ^ the considera- 



/ 



— 8 — 

tion that he has long ago forsaken the church is only an 
aggravation of his alleged fault." 

It would hardly, perhaps, have been expected that a sec- 
ond Council, with the same moderator, should so explicitly 
contradict the first. It distinctly contravenes, and essen- 
tially nullifies, that section in the Platform which declares, 
in terms, that "when a Council, properly convened and 
orderly proceeding, has pronounced its advice, a second 
Council upon the substance of the same question, or upon 
the advice of the first, is manifestly improper" (part 3, 
chap. 2, sec. 10). It tends to leave everything unsettled ; to 
produce as many Councils as there are possible varieties of 
opinion among those who call them ; to put an end to all 
Councils, by making all useless. 

But this may not be of cardinal importance. The really 
startling thing about this statement is that it prompts any 
criminal to evade a church- censure, by abandoning church- 
communion. It allows and encourages any church to save 
itself the trouble of examining and condemning the grossest 
offender, on condition that it will treat him as a recognized 
absentee. The specific allegations of those who know, the 
universal conviction pervading the community, that a mem- 
ber of the church is flagrantly immoral, leaves the church 
at liberty, at its own discretion, to say nothing about him 
except that he does not come to the communion. ; 

It certainly seems to me that in this declaration the Coun- 
cil — without intention, of course, but in effect — has heaped 
dirt on the graves of its ancestors, and done grave dishonor 
to the name and the cause of the Lord of righteousness. 
The Lord says : "Woe unto that man by whom the offense 
Cometh." This rule says, rather : " Woe unto that church 
by whom the offense thus coming is exposed." The com- 
mon sense of the world is justified in demanding that the 
wolf in sheep's clothing shall be shown for what he is. But 
this rule contemplates simply shutting the gate, when he 
goes from the fold, and leaving the fatal lamb-skins upon 
him. 

3. Though not of any primary importance, a dictum of 
the Council in regard to a certain class of cases, specified in 



I 



— 9 — 

tlie Letter-Missive, claims a moment's attention. It concerns 
members, otherwise unaccused, who absent themselves from 
the services, on the ground that they believe the pastor 
guilty of crime, though tlie church, after investigation, has 
acquitted and sustained him. The declaration is, that such 
a reason for absence, without asking for letters of dismissal, 
is "entirely invalid, schismatic, and unchristian." The 
wrath of the Council seems fully aroused against such 
wrong-doers, though it had just opened an outlet, so instant 
and so easy, for those accused of scandalous offenses. 

Undoubtedly it is true that a member, believing, on suffi- 
cient evidence, that the pastor of the church is guilty of some 
tremendous wickedness, of which, however, the church as a 
body remains unconvinced, should seek elsewhere, when 
that is practicable, religious instruction, with the comfort 
and help which the sacraments bring. If such a one should 
continue in the church for any purpose of factious disturb - 
iance, he is justly to be condemned. His withdrawal from 
fit, rather, is plainly a matter of Christian duty. 
I But there are manifold cases, not conceivable only, but 
Actual, in which retirement from the church and union with 
another should properly be long postponed. There are not 
a few — as where no other church exists in the community, 
or in the neighborhood — where a letter of dismissal cannot 
be asked for, except as a mere matter of form. The better 
course would seem to be, in any such case, for the member 
to wait, in patience and in prayer, till God in His providence 
shall bring to light the hidden things, and make others the 
sharers of the painful knowledge which already is his. Such 
patient waiting may be the only possible way to rescue the 
church, and secure in the end the preaching from its pulpit 
of a purifying Gospel. 

But, in the meantime, the Council says that such a mem- 
ber "should show himself loyal to the authority" of the 
church; and it regards "the conceit that he may protest 
more effectually against the supposed error of the church 
by partially withdrawing from its fellowship " as " eminent- 
ly dangerous and disorganizing." If this means anything 
pertinent to the case, it means that in the proper or neces- 



I 



— 10 — 

sary interval, between the conviction of the pastor's gnilt 
and the final request for letters of dismissal, the member is 
bound to hear the Gospel from what he feels to be lying lips, 
and to receive the body of Christ from hands which he un- 
doubtingly believes to be defiled with unconfessed lust. If 
he does not, the church will have right to drop him, what- 
ever his relations to it have been, however strong his con- 
tinuing interest in it and its welfare. It would seem, indeed, 
according to this statement, to have further right to cut him 
off, with formal censure, as "a dangerous disorganizer." 

I do not know but the churches are prepared for a state- 
ment of this sort, and are ready to place it among their 
church-rules. But, for myself, I hesitate to accept it. In 
things so sacred as the fellowship of the personal soul with 
God, its Saviour, through His truth and His sacraments, I 
am not prepared to say that the ministry of one believed to 
be vicious must be accepted because others adhere to him ; 
that the ignorance of the church is to supersede the knowl- 
edge of the personal member, as the rule of his conduct. It 
may be quite impossible for him, under his convictions of 
duty, and in the circumstances in which he is placed, to ask 
for final letters of dismissal. He may even hope, by tarry- 
ing in the church, to be able to do something for it in the 
end, when the hour of calamity, which he foresees, has come 
upon it. But, in the interval, it strikes me that not his 
absence from the services, but his continued attendance 
upon them — his listening to the teachings, and accepting the 
sacraments, of one whom lie entirely believes an impure 
hypocrite — this is the course which most requires apology 
or defense. And Plymouth Church itself, in a recent con- 
spicuous and significant case, appears to be of the same 
opinion. 

The Roman Catholic Church holds, of course, that the 
character of the ofiiciating priest, however bad, does not im- 
pair th^ validity of his sacraments, if properly adminis- 
tered ; his official prerogative inhering indelibly, independ- 
ently of his character. But I suspect^that it will take more 
than the statement of this Council to make a like doctrine 
current with Protestants, concerning their ministers. 



— 11 — 

As I said, however, this is not a matter of primary impor- 
tance to the churches at large, however important the riglit 
doctrine on the subject may be to individuals. But the next 
topic treated in this Result is of supreme consequence to the 
churches ; and the statements in it, if accepted and carried 
out, appear to me simply destructive to the rights of indi- 
viduals, and to all proper external relations between the 
churches. 

4. A Mutual Council is defined in the Result as "one 
selected by mutual agreement between the parties." It did 
not, perhaps, need professors in seminaries, or presidents of 
colleges, coming hundreds or thousands of miles for the 
purpose, to give this definition. If there were any question, 
as certainly there was, on which their testimony would have 
been timely, it was this: "Is a Mutual Council one in 
which the two opposed parties agree in common on every 
member of the trihnnal f or is it one in w4iich they agree in 
common on having a tribunal, and then proceed to consti- 
tute it, not in common, but mutually, by reciprocal inter- 
change of selection of its members V^ 

This Council assumes it to be the former ; and thereupon 
procceeds to say that Plymouth Church had "a right" to 
object to two of the churches named by her who had de- 
manded the Council, and to make the objection at a meeting 
subsequent to that at which they had been named, and it 
had been agreed that they should be notified. 

If that was the opinion of the members of the Council, 
they certainly are not to be blamed for expressing it. But, 
if their doctrine shall be generally accepted, it will have the 
effect to put an end to Mutual Councils, in all exciting and 
endamaging cases — the very cases for which they are needed. 
If one party has ahvays "the right" to object to churches 
or ministers named by the other, inasmuch as the right is 
sure to be exercised by the party endangered in the sum- 
moning of the Council, the attempt to constitute such a 
tribunal must be about as hopeful as the attempt to get any 
fugitive from justice to beg judges and juries to give him a 
trial. 



— 12 — 

No limit whatever is put by the Council on the exercise of 
this "right." If one church is objected to as too near, an- 
other may be as too remote. One is too large, and another 
too small. One has in it — a possible delegate — a friend of 
one party ; and another is suspected of being committed, by 
some passage in its history, to a hostile course. The 
minister of one is not loose enough in his notions of retribu- 
tive justice ; and the minister of another does not see the 
propriety of opening the Lord' s Supper to all the world, at 
the risk of casting its holy pearls before the swine. The 
reasons are numberless to give excuse for objection. In- 
deed, no reason whatever need be given. The "right" is 
affirmed ; and the exercise of a right is not to be challenged, 
and requires no defense. 

It is nearly as plain as anything can be, that any pastor 
who, with reason or without it, is under the apprehension 
that a Mutual Council may be likely to harm him, will never 
allow such a Council to be formed, if this dictum is ac- 
cepted ; that any majority in a church, which expects or 
fears to be rebuked if its action is reviewed, will find no 
churches acceptable to it, except what it may name itself. 
And it is certainly just as plain that to break up the system 
of Mutual Councils is to dissolve the Congregational com- 
munion. It is to take away the chance of redress from every 
oppressed member of the church. It is to give the majority 
in each church an unhindered course, in which to work 
what wrong it will. It is to vacate the fellowship of the 
churches of significance and value, and to reduce it to a 
mere tradition or a name. A more dangerous blow was 
never delivered at that church- order which has guarantied to 
minorities a right to be heard, and made each church re- 
sponsible for right- doing to the many standing in fellowship 
with it. 

The Mutual Council, whose members are not chosen in 
common, but by reciprocal interchange of selection, and in 
which, therefore, either party may be sure of having those 
in whom it confides — this has been the nexus of the com- 
munion, and the strong defense of the injured or the weak. 



^13 — 

If it be said that denying the right of either party to ob- 
ject to those proposed by the otlier, would leave each free to 
till half the Council with its own partisans, the answer is 
obvious. When the proceedings of a Council are public, 
neither one of tliem can afford to be represented in it, ex- 
clusively or largely, by such partisans. The public finds 
them out, and discredits them at once. If their votes are 
against the argument, those votes hurt themselves, but help 
nobody else. In fact, the weakness of the cause which they 
try to assist, is only by them made apparent. The moral 
weight of the Council of 1874, came immensely from the 
fact that churches had been called to it from the centers of 
influence, without regard to commitments or prepossessions, 
and that a very considerable number held views opposed to 
those of the churches which had convened them. The 
weakness of this last Council comes as largely from the fact 
that the great majority of the men who composed it, were 
believed to be called because they were in S3'mpathy with 
the action to be scrutinized, or with its authors. The 
presence of others, not understood to be thus pre-pledged, 
was all that saved the Council from popular disregard. 
Without such men in it, the effect of its Result, as compared 
with that of the other sort of Council, would have been like 
the weight of a ball of punk measured against a solid shot. 
Recognized partisanship makes the ablest man weak, the 
most eminent insignificant, and strips any verdict which 
they give or secure of value and force. 

While common-sense governs men's conduct, they will 
see this for themselves, and act accordingly. But the con- 
ceded right of objection to members of a Council, named, on 
his proper responsibility, by the adverse party, is simply 
destructive to that system of tribunals which has been 
hitherto the strength and boast of Congregationalists. 

5. The Council assures the public that it finds no reason 
to call in question the method by which the "Investigating 
Committee" of Plymouth Church was constituted, or the in- 
tegrity with which its proceedings were conducted. 

That the gentlemen who served on that anomalous com- 
mittee are worthy of all social consideration, as pleasant 



— 14 — 

friends, kind neighbors, valuable citizens, no one will be so 
ready to admit as one wlio lias known most of them long. 
Bat it has not been usually the case that an investigating 
committee is named wholly by the party accused. It does 
not generally consist exclusively of his personal friends, or 
business associates. If acting for a church, and taking the 
place of the church-committee, it has not been common to 
put upon it, as influential members, those not themselves 
members of the church — attendants on its services, but con- 
fessing for themselves no public allegiance to the law of its 
Head. It has not been customary for the committee, so con- 
stituted, to take as its legal adviser and counsel, the devoted 
and diligent attorney of the accused. And instances will 
hardly be found, prior to 1874, in which that attorney saw 
witnesses beforehand, and arranged with them so to shape 
his questions as to seem to examine them, while keeping 
from the committee damaging testimony — which is known 
to have been done in the instance, at least, of Mr. Richards. 

A committee so composed, and so conducted, whatever 
the personal worth of its members, would seem about as 
effective for elucidating obscure and complicated facts, 
especially for evolving inimical facts against its nominator, 
as a brush of feathers for excavating mines. It may have 
its uses, but that is not one of them. In comparison with it, 
the committee of three distinguished, wealthy, and estima- 
ble gentlemen who examined the New York City accounts, 
and certified to their correctness, a few months before the 
Ring exploded, was a judicious and satisfactory body. 

If the Council, however, thought this arrangement fair, 
and adapted to relieve men' s minds of uncertainty, they are 
not to be complained of for having approved it. But 
neither must they complain hereafter when any Congrega- 
tional minister, accused of whatever concealed wickedness, 
insists on having a similar committee : selected by himself ; 
comprising men of great social power, but not members of 
the church ; guided and guarded by his vigilant attorney ; 
sitting in secret ; selecting the witnesses whom it will hear ; 
judging beforehand, as the Council says is right, " whether 
their evidence would be material ;" superseding the regular 



— 15 — 

committee of the church, and making at last only such a re- 
port of the evidence presented as shall seem best fitted to 
sustain its result. A minister must be exacting, indeed, who 
is not satisfied with such astute and comprehensive arrange- 
ments for guarding him from a threatening inquiry. And, 
as the minister has no personal rights which every other 
church-member does not equally possess, any member may 
demand a like committee when Ids character and acts are 
the subject of scrutiny. I see not wliy, upon this plan, tlie 
Examining Committee should not be wholly laid aside, in 
cases of discipline ; and members be released from even the 
necessity of refraining from the communion in order to 
escape its scrutiny. When that has come to pass, the func- 
tion of the church, as a guard and a witness for Christian 
purity, will seem, according to the logical force of this Re- 
sult, to be quite fulfilled. 

Since the Council endorses the constitution and the con- 
duct of this famous committee, without hesitation and with- 
out limitation, it looks as if a precedent of considerable 
importance had got itself established— so far, at least, as the 
earnest approval of this large and respectable representative 
body can give it establishment. 

6. Lest, however, even this arrangement should not give a 
wholly sufficient protection to a minister, accused of what- 
ever wickedness, the Council in another way makes his 
security nearly perfect. This is one of the most remarkable 
things connected with this remarkable Result. 

The church in the Andover Seminary had addressed to the 
Plymouth Church a wise and tender fraternal letter, ex- 
pressing its concern at the injury suffered by the cause of 
religion, in consequence of the painful anxiety felt by many 
in regard to the character of the pastor of the latter, and 
asking the Plymouth Church to unite with it in calling a 
Council, fully and impartially to examine the facts, and set 
the Christian mind of the country forever at rest. The letter 
was adopted after the recent Council had been summoned, 
as touching a matter of vital importance which that had not 
been invited to treat ; and it reached Plymouth Church only 
forty-eight hours before this Council was assembled. Going 



— 16 — 

wholly outside its Letter-Missive, the Council took up this 
application, and adopted certain resolutions about it : — a 
function for which it had not been appointed, from which it 
was properly wholly debarred by that fundamental provision 
in the Platform which expressly limits every Council to 
^'the subjects specified in the Letter-Missive," and on which 
it had no more right to enter than on the simultaneous trial 
of General Babcock. In giving an opinion adverse to the 
letter of the Andover Church, it curiously illustrated the 
revolutionary character of much of its action. The old rule 
has been that an ex-parte Council cannot be called till a 
Mutual Council has been refused. Here the rule is reversed, 
end for end, and a Council, certainly wholly ex parte as 
concerning this matter, declares a future Mutual Council out 
of order. 

In doing this abnormal thing it '' solemnly declares" cer- 
tain propositions which maybe best understood by applying 
them to a possible case. 

The church in A entered into fellowship with the church 
in B, when the latter was constituted, and still stands in that 
fellowship, interchanging with it members, meeting it in 
Councils, and in its measure responsible for it before the 
public. 

The church in B called a pastor, and at his installation 
the church in A entered also into fellowship with Am, by a 
distinct and separate act ; and it stands in that fellowship, 
receiving him to its pulpit, meeting him in Councils, inviting 
him on occasion to administer its sacraments, and in its 
measure responsible for him before the public. 

This pastor comes to be considered by many immoral in 
life, perhaps an infidel in opinion ; and such a rumor per- 
vades the air, the evidence of the fact is widely affirmed to 
be in possession of many persons. But under his strong 
personal influence, and through the incessant and shrewd 
activity of those who adhere to him, the mass of his church 
continue their attachment, and one by one those who dissent 
are extruded from it. Comparative unanimity is thus 
secured, though at the sacrifice of much that was important. 
But still the rumors do not abate, and the Gospel seems dis- 
honored in the house of its friends. 



— 17 — 

The cliurcli in A feels the increasing and overwhelming 
burden of this evil fame attaching to the pastor to whom its 
public fellowship has been pledged, and is anxious that the 
matter be impartially examined — that, if innocent, the min- 
ister accused may be cleared, or, if guilty, be removed ; that 
in either case the pressure may be lifted from the churches, 
and the name of Christ be freed from reproach. It has no 
end whatever to gain except his protection, if he be guilt- 
less ; the protection of the churches, if he is not ; and the 
furtherance, either way, of the supreme and immortal cause. 
Under the "solemn declaration'' of this Council, what can it 
do to accomplish this end ? 

In general, the reply is : It can do nothing not already 
precisely specified in the Cambridge Platform of 1648 ; for 
the Boston Platform of 1865 seems, with intention, to be left 
out of sight. But suppose that those more ancient regula- 
tions did not contemplate the precise case, so exceptional in 
its nature, where a man widely accused of guilt is still sus- 
tained by the mass of his church ; cannot the complaining 
church then apply to the new case the principles of that 
Platform, and solicit the other church to unite with it in 
convening a Council, mutually selected, to investigate the 
acts and the character of the man who is pastor of the one, 
and to whom the other has given its fellowship ? "No," 
says the Council, ' ' it cannot do that. Here is what and all 
it can do." 

First, it may suitably admonish the church in B, and re- 
monstrate against its dereliction of duty. — That church is 
not the prime or real offender. It may be deceived, as were 
even the apostles when they trusted their treasurer ; but its 
misapprehension is not a crime. The pastor is the one 
whom the scandal concerns, and who needs investigation. 
But concerning him the church in A, which has given to 
him its public fellowship, is not allowed to even inquire. It 
is as if in a suspected commercial crime the alleged forger 
could not even be questioned, but only the innocent acceptor 
of his note. 

Secondly, this remonstrance bringing no satisfaction, the 
anxious and troubled church in A may acquaint other 



— 18 — 

cliiirclies with the objectionable action of the church in B, 
still refraining from complaint of its pastor, and ask them to 
unite with it in a further admonition. — This is a step which 
the Boston Platform does not recognize, and the authority 
for inserting which, on the part of this Council, is not ap- 
parent. It simply puts a further fetter on a progress already 
sufficiently slow. It requires a most unwelcome correspond- 
ence, carrying the discussion into different churches, involv- 
ing the risk of division in each, and still aiming, as before, 
not at the pastor, whom the rumors affect, but at his con- 
tented and well-meaning church. But suppose that time 
and patience are given for doing this work, and that still no 
issue satisfactory is reached. What next may be done '{ 

Thirdly, the admonishing churches, taking the law into 
their own hands, may forbear communion with the church 
in B, and call a Council to consider the case ; but this Coun- 
cil ' ' has power to inquire and consider only ' ' whether the 
church in B "is really acting contrary to order and duty." 

Even power to exclude it, or advise its exclusion, from the 
general fellowship, if it should be found to be so acting, is 
not affirmed by this cautious declaration. So far as appears, 
the Council can only ''inquire and consider," which, per- 
haps, they might have done at home, without taking any 
corporate action. Certainly they can take none which di- 
rectly concerns the pastor involved. As to that, the church 
in A is absolutely, vehemently, precluded from any attempt 
at it by the dictum of this assembly. No such church, it 
says, with unwonted emphasis, ' ' has the right or the power ' ' 
to claim to take part in any investigation of his character, 
either through a Mutual Council proposed by itself, or by 
an ex-parte Council, on the failure of that. The entire pro- 
cess must stop short with the calling of a Council to "in- 
quire and consider" whether the related church in B is act- 
ing regularly in retaining for its pastor a man whom it con- 
fides in, while others believe him an immoral skeptic. 

A more perfect illustration of the "way not to do it," it 
seems to me, was never presented since the son in the para- 
ble said, " I go, sir," and went not. 



— 19 - 

The churoli in A entered into fellowship with the church 
in B, and still raises no question as co its general moral 
soundness. If it made objection to its rules of procedure, it 
could arrange that, by a conference or a Council. But that 
is not its present grievance. It, also, by a separate public 
act, entered into fellowship with the pastor of that church. 
It has no judgment to utter against him ; but it knows him 
to be suspected by many intelligent and God-fearing persons 
to be a guilty hypocrite. His shadowed name darkens its 
life. The unabating rumors against him make further ef- 
fective Christian activity impossible for it. They give im- 
13ulse and edge to the sneer of the skeptic, and break the 
force of every sermon. But, according to the vehement vol- 
unteered deliverance of this recent assembly, it can no more 
touch him wutli any proper church-inquiry, through an im- 
partial tribunal for the purpose, than it can strike with the 
blow of impeachment a cabinet officer. The fellowship, 
which makes it responsible for him, forbids it to ask whether 
his name with the general public should be Judas or John. 
It can only approach his innocent church ; ask others to do 
so ; forbear communion with it, if it please ; and at last call 
a Council "to inquire and consider," not whether the pastor 
is a dissolute pretender to a grace he does not know, but 
whether his church has been acting in order. If it accom- 
plishes anything whatever toward investigating the charac- 
ter of the minister accused, with whom it stands in public 
fellowship, and whose alleged wickedness brings a constant 
and sore reproach upon it, it does this only by indirection, 
and under the cover of a different aim It can only reach 
him by considering, and possibly censuring at last, not him- 
self, but those who believe in him. It can only raise the 
question ot* guilt in the pulpit, by inquiring into the orderly 
conduct of the possibly mistaken but morally sound disci- 
ples in the pews. 

If this is Congregationalism, I cannot but suspect that the 
general Christian mind of the country will think it has had 
about enough of it. Certainly no priest or minister in any 
other body of Christians ever known on earth was so care- 
fully and entirely shielded from inquiry, as to his character, 



— 20 — 

as is the pastor of a Congregational chnrcli, according to the 
statement of this assembly, so long as he succeeds in keep- 
ing his hold upon his circle of local hearers. His power to 
deceive them is the guaranty of his safetj^-. Their ignorance 
is his absolute defense. He may laugh at all ecclesiastical 
inquiry, from whatever quarter, so long as his personal fol- 
lowers adhere, and while the " solemn declaration " of this 
Council spreads above him its shield and buckler. 

As if to drive the very last nail in the screen which is to 
hide him, the Council makes even this tedious, indirect, and 
unworthy process to be conditioned upon a previous ''neglect 
to investigate" on the part of the church to which he min- 
isters. If there has been some form of investigation, with 
which that church has declared itself satisfied, the church 
which stands in fellowship with it cannot, without an un- 
just violence, send its first admonition. 

It does not seem extravagant to say that no paralysis ever 
chained all the muscles of motion and of speech as the state- 
ment of this unauthorized Council would chain the zeal of an 
intelligent church, which sees the whole progress of religion 
impeded by the swarming and ever-renewed allegations of 
unconfessed wickedness in one with whom it stands in fel- 
lowship, but into whose conduct, according to this, it can no 
more inquire than into the secrets of a Turkish harem. I 
would not overstate the matter ; but, really, this declaration 
of the Council almost amounts to a practical invitation to 
any deceptive and plausible rogue to enter the Congrega- 
tional ministry, and there get a safety which the world out- 
side is not ready to offer. 

N^o heresy, even, it would appear, however destructive, 
can be questioned about by the neighboring churches until it 
has so far gained acceptance with a church that it is willing 
to allow and endorse it. A practical protection is carefully 
secured to it, in all its earlier development and progress ; and 
the doors of the communion seem flung wide open for any 
defection from the faith of the Gospel. 

If it be said that the Council was limited by the Cambridge 
Platform, and so shut up to these damaging conclusions, the 
reply is immediate : that there is a Platform later than that, 



— 21 — 

more recent therefore in its equivalent authority, and much 
more familiar among the churches, which, at least, provides 
that any church, after due admonition, may call a Council 
to advise whether another church "tolerates and upholds 
notorious scandals;" which Council, finding that it does so 
after proper inquiry, may advise the withholding from it of 
communion. If it be said that even this authority for insti- 
tuting an inquiry, uninvited by the one church, but indis- 
pensable to the others, does not warrant a full investigation 
into the alleged scandalous facts, it must be replied that such 
technical and verbal adherence to a rule, when the case is not 
one which the rule full}' contemplated, would be a most idle 
"sticking in the letter." Grant that the ancient Platform, 
framed in a pure simplicity of manners, did not contemplate 
precisely the case of one to whom his church shall adhere 
while multitudes of minds outside of that church conceive 
him guilty, and concerning whom, after, it may be, dreadful 
years of discussion and suspense, opinion is more divided 
than at first ; — Congregationalism, if possessing a true vital- 
ity, must certainly be able to apply its principles, by some 
normal process in harmony with those principles, to the 
exacting and novel case. If it cannot, it is too weak for a 
crisis, and already too old for the times. If it cannot, the 
organic law which restrains it, and makes it incapable of 
meeting such emergencies, is condemned beyond the hope of 
reversal. 

The Andover proposal was in no sense inconsistent with 
the earliest Platform, much less with the later. It was in 
perfect intimate harmony with their spirit, and their princi- 
ples ; though it sought, I may admit, to illustrate that spirit, 
apply those principles, in a case hitherto quite unexampled. 
Acceptance of it would have remedied a defect, and filled 
out a polity. Rejection of it, and the substitution for it of 
something as utterly foreign as possible to both Platform and 
polity, is the very sharpest dishonoring censure that could, 
as I think, have been passed upon both. 

But this is the thing which comes next in order. 

7. Having made the Mutual Councils of churches either 
practically impossible, by giving to each contesting party 



— 22 — 

the right of veto on the other's nominees, or else, as where a 
pastor is involved, incompetent to any useful office, and ap- 
parently feeling still, in spite of any pre-commitment of its 
members, and in spite of the impassioned declarations which 
met them, that further investigation must in some way be 
had, outside of the church, in order to any relief of religion 
from the load it has been carrying, and especially to any timely 
vindication of the churches of its order, the Council proceeds 
to invent a new instrument for the purpose ; and this is the 
real consummation of its work. 

The fact that it had no authority to do this, conferred by 
the Letter which was its charter, does not seem in the least 
to have hindered its zeal. For any such purpose it was only 
a casual, illegitimate assembl}^, as destitute of authority as 
any street-meeting. But it took up the work with ardent 
devotion, and certainly came to a wonderful result. It pro- 
poses an instrument for such investigation, apparently 
simple, bat in reality curiously complex, and places the en- 
tire management of it as completely in the hands of those 
desiring a particular result as the wheel of the ship is in the 
hands of the helmsman. 

A brief analysis will make this apparent. 

First, a committee of three members of the Council is ap- 
pointed, to organize a commission ; these three members 
being excellent gentlemen, whose confidence in the pastor to 
be investigated is said to be expressed and complete. 

Secondly, these members, in forming the commission, are 
authorized to select any five names out of twenty; among 
which twenty are several of gentlemen whose eagerness for a 
result of vindication would be likely to stand a tremendous 
shock, from whatever evidence. 

Thirdly, if these five nominees should not all consent or 
be able to serve, any three of them are a quorum, and may 
fill up the vacancies with any persons whom they shall select, 
whether named in the previous list or not. 

If a commission organized like this is not, from its incep- 
tion, committed, by all the sentiments of its members, to a 
special result, the customary laws which regulate human 
action must have been reversed, and the stream and the 
fountain be no longer alike. 



— 23 - 

Fourthly, this commission is, apparently, not to be organ- 
ized till after the lapse of sixty days, during which charges 
may be presented — after which they cannot be — by parties 
making themselves responsible [ it is not said to whom ] for 
the truth and proof of the same. Whether these parties 
must be members of Plymouth Church or not does not clearly 
appear.* The most intimate representative of the pastor in 
that church has once said that "by all civil or ecclesiastical 
law" they must be. But subsequent statements appear to 
change this. That they cannot know beforehand who are to 
try the charges which they present, is obvious at first sight. 
They present them in the dark, to an unknown tribunal. 

Fifthly, the commission, so organized, without hearing any 
evidence in support of the charges, may decide that they 
have already been sufficiently tried, and on that ground may 
dismiss the comjDlaint. 

Sixthly, if at the end of sixty days no charges have been 
presented, it seems to be provided, in a strangely compli- 
cated series of words, that the commission may yet be or- 
ganized, if the committees of the church and the Council 
deem it desirable, to hear testimony not previously given, 
which they think may throw^ light upon the charges already 
tried. In other words, if the committee of the church wish 
then to present ex-parte testimony on behalf of the pastor, 
the commision may be organized to hear such testimony, and 
to render a general verdict upon it. It would not be stranger 
than other things have been, if this should turn out to be the 
sole function of this commission. 

By the approval of the Council in the parallel case of the 
"investigating committee" this commission is authorized 
beforehand to sit in secret, to use its own judgment in calling 
for witnesses, and in concluding, before they are called, 
"whether their evidence would be material." It is unre- 
strained by any rules, except the discretion of its members. 
It cannot, probably, protect witnesses before it from suits for 
slander, on account of their testimony. It is responsible to 
no one. It has simply to report the result Avhich it may 
reach to the Examining Committee of Plymouth Church, to 
be given by that committee to the public ; and Plymouth 



— 24 — 

Church itself is not even advised to accept the result, or do 
anything about it, except to publish it. The action of the 
commission is evidently intended, however, to be a finality, 
beyond which inquiry never shall go. 

It would certainly be unjust to the many honest members 
of the Council to even suspect that this curious commission 
was allowed by them to be organized in their name for the 
purpose of acquittal. It might not, perhaps, be wholly un- 
just to the shrewder minds behind the scheme to suspect 
that they thought it adapted to give a show of readiness to 
meet hostile charges, without involving serious danger — an 
ecclesiastical Quaker-gun, which looks ready for any service, 
but through whose silent wooden mouth no shot can pass. 
It certainly is not too much to say that no result in the least 
likely to be attained by such a commission can do anything 
important toward enlightening and purifying the fetid dark- 
ness in which the churches of Brooklyn and of the land have 
long been walking. 

But, even if it could, is it not a humiliating, if not an 
alarming fact, that all the ancient and honored methods 
of general administration among related Congregational 
churches, by means especially of Mutual Councils, are sud- 
denly completely set aside, by an assembly not empowered 
to do it, in favor of a contrivance like this — extemporized, 
untried, and possibly attended with more peril and per- 
plexity than the wisest can foresee ? It is a contrivance as 
unknown as court-martials to all preceding Congregational 
history. It may be wholly ex-parte in constitution, while 
fulfilling perfectly the provisions which frame it. It could 
not displace the pastor from his pulpit, though it should 
find him guilty at last of worse offenses than his accusers 
have ever alleged. It cannot even advise the withdrawing of 
fellowship from the church which sustains him, though that 
church, in the face of a damnatory verdict, should unitedly 
adhere to him. It is as wholly irresponsible a body, to the 
Council which devised it, to the affiliated churches of the 
communion, as it is to Prince Bismarck. It need not give a 
semblance of reason for its finding ; and any Council subse- 
quently convened could not act upon that finding, except 



— 25 — 

after full consideration of its grounds, without the grossest 
injustice. 

One cannot but stand perplexed, and almost aghast, before 
the proposal for such a commission, put forth in the name 
of the Congregational churches, from the sea- coast to the 
mountains, by an assembly not authorized to do any such 
thing, and by an assembly which could not regard the An- 
dover proposal as properly Congregational ; which felt itself 
constrained to advise its rejection, because chapter and verse 
did not appear in the Cambridge Platform empow^ering one 
church to ask another to unite with it in a Mutual Council, 
to clear, if possible, the character of a minister, pastor of the 
one church, but received to its public fellowship by the other. 
The gnat and the camel will recur to one's thoughts ! 

The development of Congregationalism, in a needed direc- 
tion, by a cordial approval of the Andover proposal, would 
have made churches more fraternal, ministers improperly 
accused more safe, and would have added stability and vigor 
to a sj'stem of government adapted at the outset to a limited 
region, but now extending over areas continental, of which 
the Fathers never dreamed. But this novel arrangement, for 
an irresponsible secret commission, is no more a development 
of any principle in the Platforms of the communion, or in its 
previous histor^^, than an iron spike driven into its trunk is 
the development of a peach-tree. If it should become a pre- 
cedent at all, it wonld simply be a precedent for an unhin- 
dered license in inventing new methods of church-inquiry, 
and putting upon them our ancient name. The next Council 
might, with equal propriet}^, propose the public drawing of 
lots to decide a man's character, as more scriptural in its na- 
ture, and not less Congregational. 

Tlie above are some of the principal points presented in 
this remarkable " Result,'' wliicli appear to justify a degree 
of apprehension, and to be fitted to make men pause before 
they allow themselves to even seem to be committed to 
principles so rash, and to measures so strange. But, after 
all, the radical trouble, with any one who thoughtfully con- 
siders it, lies deeper than these. 



— 26 — 

To put a power, practically unlimited, of excluding mem- 
bers on account of their "acts," as showing a want of 
" Christian sympathy," into the hands of any majority ; to 
authorize any cliarch to let the great sinner go unrebuked, if 
he has ceased attending the services ; to require a member 
who fully believes in the pastor's guilt to continue to at- 
tend on his ministrations, when a letter of dismissal is tor 
any reason impossible to be asked for, denouncing his 
course as "unchristian" if he does not; to make Mutual 
Councils practically impossible, in difficult cases, by requir- 
ing a common agreement of the parties on all the members, 
and giving to each "the right" to object to the other's 
nominees ; to endorse for the past, and so authorize for the 
future, an "investigating committee" selected by the ac- 
cused, not wholly composed of even church-members, and 
affectionately devoted to the man whose acts it is to ex- 
amine ; to forbid one church to ask another to unite with it 
in a faithful endeavor to clear themselves, and the Christian 
community, of the injury involved in ever-recurring and un- 
settled charges against a minister for whom both in their 
measure are responsible ; to put forth a commission, such as 
that here proposed, as a substitute for the usual Councils of 
the churches — these things are enough to startle the dullest. 

But still behind and beyond all these breaks forth on 
one' s thoughts that greater question, more unsettling to the 
mind than even these strange and eccentric propositions : If 
a Result like this be accepted, then what is left, in the entire 
Congregational plan, to be regarded as finally settled ? What 
can ever be considered fixed and defined, beyond the reach 
of the first rash impulse ? 

If one Council can commend the rules which a previous 
Council — certainly not of less intelligence — has declared, if 
carried out, sufficient to justify the withdrawal of fellow- 
ship ; if one can adjudge specific cases, in efi"ect, if not in 
form, by principles which the other declared unsound ; if 
one can answer three several questions, specifically proposed 
to a previous Council, and answer them in exactly the 
opposite sense ; if a Council, not empowered for the purpose, 
can construct and set forth a wholly new instrument for 



— 27 — 

cliurcli-inqiiiiy, and supersede by it all the usual church 
tribunals ; if it can forget its own Letter-Missive, and enter 
on important and difficult business of which in that ap- 
peared no mention ; if even the permanent Platforms of the 
communion have no directing or limiting force in any such 
case, but a Council, once organized, may consider any ques- 
tion, and assume an}- function, which others shall suggest 
or which it may contrive— wiiat basis remains for any settled 
rules whatever ( Why contend for such rules, w^hen the 
only possible effect seems to be to heap up sand, which the 
next foot may scatter, or any puff of breath blow down ? 
Of what possible use are discussion and effort to get any- 
thing defined, or anything established ? And if that cannot 
be, what alternative is left for one who would build an or- 
derly church, according to wise and intelligible rules, on 
whose permanent validity he can rely, but to get himself out, 
as soon as he can, of such ricket}^ confusion ? It is idle to 
build our edifices of stone, if the rules of the church, more 
important to it than buildings, are so mutable and shifting. 
Anybody can put materials together, if they are solid ; but 
it takes nothing less than miraculous power to make a per- 
manent wall of water. 

I left the positions which it had been pleasant for me to 
occup3", because of the pressure of these thoughts upon me. 
I did not do it as declaring a purpose to leave at once the 
communion I was born in, in which my fathers had minis- 
tered before me, and in which my whole public life has been 
passed. I have no claim to influence others ; but, for my- 
self, I wait to see what others say, .what the general mind of 
the churches says, to these extraordinary recent proceedings. 
It may be that such a reaction w^ill come as will give to the 
general scheme of government, which to me now appears 
almost fatally threatened, a new term of life, with more of 
stability, order, and strength. Bat, unless such comes, 
I do not see how any man can abide for long in a house so 
frail in its foundations, and so infirm in its structure, that it 
may tumble in heaps around him at any moment. 

Certainly, I cannot. I have not years enough left for 
work to give any large future part of them to rebuilding the 



— 28 — 

platform on wliicli I am to stand. I see tlie lieads around 
me growing winter. I know that whatever force I have 
must now be used for the service of God, in the manifesta- 
tion of his Divine Son. With me the blossoms have fallen; 
the ripening frnit-season is fast passing ; the October tints 
are not far in the distance. There are subjects on which I 
love to dwell, as those who hear me will bear witness ; but 
these questions of a changeful external polity are not among 
them. There are transcendent and immortal results, for 
others and myself, for which I would work. I cannot be 
always unavailingly trying to get the very primary rules of 
church-order re-established. 

The Congregational system has had a great history. Its 
colleges and seminaries, as well as its churches, are trophies 
that will not let others sleep. It has given abundantly to 
other communions, and has all the time been enriched itself. 
Its ministers have often been pre-eminent in the communities 
which they have moulded. Its missionaries have walked 
the dark places of the world, in the white of an apostolic 
charity, and sometimes in the crimson of martyrdom. Its 
great benefactors, of institutions and of man, shine crowned 
with the gold of a glorious beneficence. But it cannot live 
always by virtue of its past. If it would still surpass that 
history, in its fature development over the country, if it 
would attract the best minds to itself, or even hold the com- 
mon minds which it has trained, it must do it by securing 
the purest Gospel in the teaching and the life of both ministers 
and members. It must, at least, assure the world that it 
provides established rules, which conserve and cherish 
Christian purity ; that members received to the churches 
which it forms cannot be released from them, whatever their 
crimes, by simply absenting themselves from the sacrament ; 
that Councils are assured to the humblest member who feels 
aggrieved, in which those whom he trusts and respects shall 
sit unchallenged ; that any minister in its communion, ac- 
cused of gross sin, shall be properly questioned, and impar- 
tially judged, by a regular, speedy, and competent tribunal ; 
and that, while giving the right hand of fellowship to either 
minister or church is made as easy as to draw on one' s glove. 



— 20 — 

it shall not be as wholly impossible to withdraw it, whatever, 
the occasion, as it is to escape from one's poisoned skin. 

As at present presented, in this recent " Result," the whole 
scheme seems absurd. The man who builds churches at the 
West or the South, or in his own city, on the basis of its 
principles, appears to me to be doing all he can to heap up 
anxiety and trouble for himself, and to make the external 
Kingdom of Christ a mere confused, chaotic jumble. 

Last of all, it must be said, with the utmost emphasis, 
that a method must be found, if one does not exist, and a 
jnethod in harmony with the primary principles which are 
organic in the system, for securing a recognized purity in the 
pulpit ; at least, for releasing other churches in fellowship 
from all responsibility for any one accused, by many voices, 
of reduplicated crimes, and the question of whose possible 
guilt continues, year after year, an incessant subject of pub- 
lic debate. The recent Council distinctly admits, and con- 
spicuously affirms, that its accepted Congregational scheme 
has no regular and appropriate way whatever for searching 
into and settling a vast public scandal in one of its churches ; 
that that can only be done, if at all, by some machinery 
w^hoUy unknown to either of its Platforms, to any of its 
manuals, to any tradition of its elders ; and that neither a 
requesting member of the church, nor a member dropped 
from the roll against protest, and while making severest 
charges against the pastor, nor any sister church, near or 
remote, can eifectively secure such a Mutual Council as 
might explore and end tlie scandal. 

JSTay, more than this : each one of the proceedings by 
which the church, enthusiastically devoted to its pastor, has 
fostered to its portentous growth this detestable incubus on 
all American Christian life, is authorized and endorsed by 
this numerous Council. The dropping of one of its members 
from the roll, after he had charged the pastor with adultery, 
and when a complaint, on account of such charges, by a 
member of excellent standing and repute, had been formally 
lodged against him ; the peculiar appointment and peculiar 
procedures of the "investigating committee," on account of 
which their verdict wholly failed to restore public conli- 



-- 80 — 

dence ; the cutting off of another member, without trial or 
censure, in spite of her protest, and in face of her terrific 
declaration that the pastor, who for years had opened to her 
the secrets of his confidence, was to her knowledge a per- 
jured adulterer ; the denial to her of a Mutual Council, under 
cover of an objection to two of the churches named by her, 
which made it impossible for them to appear, and justified 
others in equally declining ; the repulse of the gentle and 
noble overture from the Andover church — every one of these 
proceedings is emphatically endorsed, the last was suggested, 
by this large and influential representative body. 

The machinery of Congregationalism, according to it, is 
precisely adapted to prolong and keep alive such a scandal 
as the present ; but is hopelessly incompetent, in its normal 
provisions, to bring it to an end. Any other similar demor- 
alizing development, hereafter arising, is, therefore, as fully 
assured as it can be of having as long a run as this, and of 
keeping the anxious mind of the public as widely feverish 
and festered as now. The irresponsible " Scandal Bureau " 
may need to be often repeated hereafter, may need to be 
made a permanent institution, under such an astonishing 
scheme of ^'government.'' 

I seriously think that if a way had been sought to make 
the Congregational name a by- word and a hissing to the en- 
tire American people, I had almost said to the civilized 
world, the way thus adopted was the very best possible ; and 
that unless the method proposed by the Andover church, or 
one equivalent to this, shall be insisted on as just and right, 
and shall ere long be carried to success, the ancient and 
honored denominational title, in which we have rejoiced, 
will be so smirched that no one who can help it will be will- 
ing to wear it. If it be true that Congregationalism, after 
centuries of development, and after three years of public 
distraction by this hideous rumor of an unexplored wicked- 
ness, has really no power to do anything about it, in an 
effective and legitimate way, but can only approve the suc- 
cessive steps by which the present paralysis has been reached, 
men ought not to be severely blamed if they adjudge it 
unworthy, at least, of further respect. 



— Sl- 
it is not pleasant to me to write thus. I remember the 
schools in which I was trained. I remember the graves by 
which I have stood. I remember the grand and saintly souls 
who are now with the Church of the First-born above. I re- 
member the almost thirty years in our own congregation — of 
happy, harmonious, and useful church life, with the truths 
that have stirred us, the promises that have raised us as on 
the swift celestial wings, the Divine influence that has 
wrought on our souls, the sacraments where we have seen 
the Lord. I remember the other churches around us, to 
which I have given whatever I had of counsel and support, 
and in whose welfare my heart has expanded with new de- 
light ; and I hardly can bear even now to read, I would al- 
most recall, if it were possible, the words I have felt con- 
strained to write. But Vera pro Gratis is as good a rule 
now as in earlier times. And it is as true of the government 
of the churches as it is of their worship, that ' ' God is not 
the author of confusion." 



PROCEEDINGS OF THE CHURCH. 



Brooklyj^, N. Y., March 13, 1876. 

Pursuant to notice from tlie pulpit on tlie last Lord's Day, 
the members of The Chuech of the Pilgrims assembled in 
their Lecture Room, at 8 p. m. The meeting was opened 
with prayer by the Pastor, R. S. Stores, D. D., Moderator. 

Mr. Walter T. Hatch then offered the following Preamble 
and Resolutions, and moved their adoption, which motion 
was seconded. 

Whereas, There is a known and authoritative ecclesiastical law of the Con- 
gregational communion, evidenced by its usages, and its accredited Platforms 
of polity, by which the validity of the acts of churches and of Councils is 
determinable; and 

Whereas, The procedures of churches and Councils which do not conform 
to that law are disorderly, illegal, and revolutionary, and not binding upon in- 
dividual churches, or the Congregational communion ; and 

Whereas, The late Advisory Council convened in Brooklyn in February, 
1876, did, in its published liesult of Council, in terms or effect, declare and 
affirm : 

(1) That a subsequent ordinary Council may disregard, annul, and set aside 
the Result of a previous Council, which acted within its Letter-Missive, and 
within the acknowledged competency of a Council : 

(2) That a Church may, without reproach for laxity of discipline, drop a 
member for alleged prolonged absence from ordinances, or other minor of- 
fense, without inquiring into the truth of graver charges publicly and 
specifically made against the moral and Christian character of such mem- 
ber ; " selecting" a minor "offense on which it shall separate him from its 
fellowship," that it may avoid the scandal of investigating and cutting him 
off for the graver offense : 

(3) That a Council may declare itself upon matters of the gravest concern to 
an individual church, and to the collective chnrches of the communion, 
which are not submitted by the Letter-Missive, from which, by the con- 
sentaneous act of the inviting and invited churches, the sole authority of 
the individual delegates and of the collective Council is derived, and by 
which its functions are strictly limited : 



— 33 — 

(4) That without licaring a church which has proffered a Mutual Council to a 
sister church, and without a submission of that question by the Letter 
Missive, a Council may advise the latter church that such proffer was un- 
authorized and should be rejected, and may thus take upon itself the ex- 
clusive responsibility for the rejection of a proffer which it was within the 
undoubted competency of one church to make, and of the other church 
to accept : 

(5) That after a.ijreein^ to unite in callinfi: a Mutual Council, each party has 
an unconditional and unlimited ri<;ht, by objecting, to exclude from the 
Council any church or Minister proposed by the other party to be invited, 
even irrespective of the question whether such excluded church or Minister 
is in truth and in fact so committed to a pronounced judgment in the case 
as to be morally ineligible to sit in the Council; that such right of exclu- 
sion exists even after the excluded church or Minister has been named, 
agreed to, and by arrangement between the parties notified that an invita- 
tion will be sent, and may be exercised so as to exclude from a Mutual 
Council (one-half of w^hicli is to be named by each partj') all churches 
which, and all Ministers who, by their maturity of age, experience, and 
wisdom, or by reason of vicinage, or special knowledge of the parties, or of 
the relevant facts on which the Council is to pronounce a conclusion, are in 
the nature of things most competent, morally and intellectually, to con- 
clude wisely and justly : 

(0) That a pastor (and by parity of reasoning a church-member, who has 
equal rights with the pastor), who is charged with a scandalous offense, may 
be permitted by his chureh to pass by the standing Examining Committee, 
and constitute a special committee, of attached friends and business asso- 
ciates (some of whom are not members of the church), to investigate the 
charge, with the assistance and direction of his private attorney ; and that 
the church may accept an investigation by such special committee, so con- 
stituted and directed, and its decision, as ample and final, and as relieving 
such church of all duty to make further inquiry into the truth of the 
charge : 

(7) That a Council may set aside the orderly method of investigating, by a 
regularly constituted Council, a grave matter which concerns the purity 
and good name of all the churches, and may substitute therefor a secret 
Commission, anomalous in the. mode of its constitution, in the definition 
and limitation of its functions, and its methods of procedure ; and, in the 

■ personnel of the tribunal, so unknown that confidence cannot be implicitly 
reposed in either its integrity, intelligence, or impartiality; therefore, 

Resolved, First : That the Church of the Pilgrims does not accede to, and 
will not be bound by, the principles so declared in this Result of Council ; that 
it regards those principles as novel, false, and revolutionary, and subversive of 
the Platforms and polity of the Congregational communion; and that it does 
not hold itself bound to continue in denominational fellowship with any church 
which adheres to those principles. 



— 34 — 

Resolved, Secondly : That upon the fundamental principles of the Congrega- 
tional Platforms and polity — principles which underlie all voluntary corporate 
association and effort — whatever concerns the collective brotherhood of the 
churches may be judged by that brotherhood in a properly constituted Council, 
ordinary or extraordinary, according to the particular case ; and that if a 
church proves itself unwilling, or unable, by some appropriate ecclesiastical 
procedure, instituted by itself, or in any orderly way proffered by sister 
churches, to rid itself of a scandal which tends and threatens to discredit all 
the churches, it is the right, and may be the imperative duty, of the brother- 
hood of churches, to institute inquiry, in order to rid itself either of such 
scandal or of such church; and that we shall regard a final denial of such right 
of the brotherhood of churches to investigate, in any extreme case, through an 
ecclesiastical Council, as endangering not only the purity but the very existence 
of the communion of Congregational churches. 



An amendment to tlie motion to adopt the Preamble and 
Resolutions was offered by Mr. Alexander Forman, that the 
Preamble and Resolutions as read, and the Address of the 
Pastor, as delivered last evening, be printed, and put into 
the hands of members of the. congregation, and further 
action be postponed for two weeks, to give a further op- 
portunity to consider these questions. 

After some discussion, in which several members took 
part, the question was called for, and decided in the negative, 
hj a rising vote, only twenty-three voting for the amendment. 

The sections of the Preamble were then read by the 
Moderator, and voted upon seriatim^ and were adopted by a 
vote of nearly four to one. 

The question upon the adoption of the Resolutions was 
then called for, and a rising vote being demanded, the first 
Resolution was carried by a vote of seventy-eight in the 
affirmative, to twenty-hve in the negative. 

The second Resolution was then read, and declared adopt- 
ed, by a vote of eighty-five to fourteen. 

The question was then put upon the adoption of the 
Preamble and Resolutions as a whole, and they were de- 
clared adopted, by a vote of ninety in the affirmative, 
against twenty-three in the negative. 



— 35 — 

The following Resolution was tlien ottered by Mr. U\ T. 
Hatch, and carried : 

Resolved, That the Moderator bo requested to appoint a coimnittce of three, 
of whom the Clerk of the church shall be one, to arrange for the publication, in 
pamphlet form, convenient for circulation, of the Address delivered last even- 
ing by our Pastor, upon the Result of the recent Advisory Council, and also 
the proceedings of this meeting ; with instructions to print at least 5,000 cop- 
ies, and to forward a copy to each Congregational church in the United 
States, and to other clergymen and prominent individuals, at their discretion ; 
and to furnish, at cost price, to the members of this church and society, what- 
ever copies they may wish for private circulation. 

On motion, the meeting adjourned. 

JOIIX C. BARNES, CUrl-, 

WALTER T. HATCH, )■ Committee. 

EDWIN S. WATERMAN. 



Ballet & Breen, Printers, 58 & 60 FultoxV St., X. Y 



AN ADDRESS 



CONGREGATIONALISM 



AS AFFECTED BY THE DECLARATIONS OF THE 



ADVISORY COUNCIL 



HELD IN BROOKLYN, N. Y.. FEBRUARY, 1876; 






BY 








RICHARD S. STORRS, 


D. 


D., 


PASTOR OF THE CHURCH OF THE 


PILGRIMS 


' 




IN BROOKLYN. 








DELIVERED MARCH 12th 


, 1876. 






WITH THE 








PROCEEDINGS OF THE CHURCH OF THE PILGRIMS, 


IN RELATION THERETO. 


MARCH 13th, 1876. 























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